


Legend

by cannedsunlight



Category: Original Work
Genre: Imagery, Inktober 2019, Water Creature, What kind? Who knows. Just imagery.
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-04
Updated: 2021-01-04
Packaged: 2021-03-15 07:20:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 574
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28559700
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cannedsunlight/pseuds/cannedsunlight
Summary: Sometimes, they say, they hear someone - some-thing - drag itself out of the water and onto the concrete, underneath the bridge where it's dark and dirty, dripping wet, and with it, the slimy strands of whatever gathers on the bottom of the canal.In the mornings there would be signs: a little path through the piles of empty cans and bottles, some crushed patches of grass, a spot of shedded mass from the bottom of the waters.





	Legend

**Author's Note:**

> Water is a recurring theme for me it seems.

There is, they say, in the water a creature. 

An old man, hidden under a layer of rubber, stands by the shore and watches the scenery, rigid. To his left, the canal slithers tirelessly, just behind that gathering of bushes. It's not the same as the river; larger, deeper, it's sewed to the city, carries its ships as if it needed to reject some of its parts, push them out like sickness.

It must like it there, that creature. 

Sometimes, they say, they hear someone - some-thing - drag itself out of the water and onto the concrete, underneath the bridge where it's dark and dirty, dripping wet, and with it, the slimy strands of whatever gathers on the bottom of the canal. Carries some of it, a handful, like it had wandered that bottom and dug up in front of him a growing mass. 

It moves itself to an upright stance and creeps along the wavering beams of bug-dotted lamplight swinging beneath metal poles. In and out, almost flickering, in and out of the mouldy shadows and the sticky coils of light. It would, they say, heave its breath as if it were pressed down by a mass of that which it wanders in. It might not notice its surroundings, be nothing but a thing being pushed out of the waters like sickness to then quietly recede; as if it were pushed out continuously but still held. 

Never in the same spot twice. 

In the mornings there would be signs: a little path through the piles of empty cans and bottles, some crushed patches of grass, a spot of shedded mass from the bottom of the waters. 

The moon sends a glint of polished wood his way, through the fanned out, bulging scrap of leaves.

To his right, the river ripples through the landscape. It works its way through the thicket, unperturbed.

Many like him come to sit and watch; they come with fishing rods and bait, with tents and lunch boxes, hearty slices of bread and butter. Some of them have family.

See there, behind that line of bushes, he might say - and look in that direction like someone who knows enough, maybe even too much, but enough to have something to say - he'd hand it to the kid by his side like a secret, a little thing pressed into its palm. They'd stare and ponder and listen and then sit down and eat two slices each, lick the butter off their fingers. I don't hear anything, the kid would say. Let's prepare the bait. I want to catch a fish. A big one. The largest. I'll name him Fred or Richie or George.

They'd sit, the two of them, until sunset, until darkness wells up and slowly rolls out of the depths of the woods. Lights begin to fill the night; the city noise does not die down, but it reaches them as if dampened.

Somewhere in the bushes, something rustles.

Now I hear something, the kid says. But I don't see anything.

It does not seem to worry, fiddles with the hem of its jacket and almost immediately afterwards asks for something to drink.

He'd hand over the can of water and say: me neither. 

Just a fox, maybe.

What else could be in the bushes or the ground of the water, if not the night that comes and goes, dipping its fingers in to feel, just for a moment, the current.


End file.
